We often get clients coming to us with one simple question, “Can I use pictures from the internet?” Now this seemingly harmless statement is one that I am glad our customers are asking before just taking the images. Unfortunately we live in a world where people assume that if an image is on the internet it is free to use. This is often not our clients fault for assuming this, and we cannot moan at them for this. People just do not know, they have not been educated in the rules of image usage; and we don’t expect everyone to be. You need to remember that someone has taken that photograph, that is their job, they earn a living from selling photographs. You would not steal from a shop, so in the same way please don’t steal from photographers and image creators.

Below is a flow chart created by Curtis Newbold, The Visual Communications Guy. The aim of the flowchart is to help people understand whether they can use an image or not. So we hope you find it useful.